GOOD NEWS: It may be an accident of the calendar, but it is still welcome news that President Noynoy Aquino is going to China on Sept. 3 and talk with Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang on what press release writers call “matters of mutual interest.”

As the Philippines is the “country of honor” in the 10^th ASEAN-China Expo (CAEXPO) scheduled Sept. 3-6 in Nanning, capital of Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region, Premier Li invited our President and the latter has reportedly accepted.

That will be a positive first step in the long journey of both countries to scaling down enmity and restoring amity between the two Asian neighbors and trading partners.

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ACCIDENT: The CAEXPO “country of honor” last year was Myanmar, but that was not why DILG Secretary Mar Roxas, and not Vice President Jojo Binay, was sent. Roxas was received by then China Vice President Xi Jinping, who is now president.

Talking of accident of time, some yellow bloggers bristled with the description of Noynoy Aquino as an “accidental” president.

No offense meant, but would Noynoy have become president were it not by the accident of his revered mother Cory dying just as the Liberal Party was looking for somebody more saleable than a laid-back Mar Roxas?

Before Cory’s death, her son was not even a dot on the radar screen. Some may attribute to fate or destiny the electrifying transfer of sympathy from the mother to the son and his resulting election as president in 2010. But others see it as just an accident of time.

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BILATERAL TALKS: Last year, an Aquino-Li meeting in the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting in Vladivostok was intensely pursued, but it did not happen. Since he became prime minister last March, Li has met with all Asian leaders except Aquino.

The Philippines must not waste this one-on-one with China’s premier who, by the way, is also receiving other leaders of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations attending the CAEXPO.

China wants direct country-to-country discussion of territorial disputes, but the Philippines has chosen to hew to the American line that a multilateral approach is better. The US wants all claimants in ASEAN speaking with one voice against China.

Handled adroitly by both parties, the coming Aquino-LI meeting could lead to direct dialogue on substantive bilateral issues — not just on territory — even while Uncle Sam is watching and whispering from behind the curtains.

Followup meetings on the technical, then ministerial, level should immediately follow as forces stoking mutual suspicion between China and the Philippines are working overtime.

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UNFRIENDLY ACT: As we said in Postscript last Tuesday (Aug. 13), the Philippine official view has been clouded by propaganda that China is a threat to its neighbors and that the US is ready to help them fight the neighborhood bully.

Unfortunately, the Chinese dragon’s overreaching is not helping any. It continues to grab strategic and resource-rich marine areas within the Philippines’ Exclusive Economic Zone. That is not a friendly act of a neighbor.

But what if China actually needs not territorial space but guaranteed access to the resources of the vast sea below it to feed its burgeoning population and fuel its giant economic machine? If so, it should say so and act accordingly.

We should know if China just wants access to rich fishing grounds and mineral fields that can be jointly exploited for common benefit. The issue of sovereignty need not become a fatal factor as joint access and mutual profit are calculated.

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IT’S ACCESS!: The name of the game is access. Even the US is now looking for areas in the Philippines for its men and materiel being expelled from a Japan rocked by protests against foreign bases.

Existing bases in Guam, Hawaii and Australia cannot absorb the US forces bring driven out of Okinawa alone. Besides, these fallback bases are too far from potential crisis points in and near the mainland.

We are ready to believe that the US is not looking for new bases here. Learning from experience that maintaining installations overseas brings a slew of trouble including crippling expenses, the US just wants greater access to base-like staging areas in the Philippines.

The ideal location of the Philippines for the displaced American forces is a leverage that President Aquino — if he wants — can use to negotiate a revision, for instance, of the onerous criminal jurisdiction provision of the PH-US Visiting Forces Agreement.

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GOOD NEIGHBORS: On China relations, what we said last Tuesday bears repeating: “Filipinos and Chinese should not tire talking and trading with each other. What one has that the other needs may be shared for common benefit.

“China need not be regarded by the Philippines as an enemy.

“Since the earth was created, we have been placed close to each other, locked in by geography as neighbors for better or for worse. Since our forebears learned to sail and brave the waves, we have been barter brothers in the ageless Asian tradition of give and take.

“There is need for an earnest mutual effort to return to the status quo ante and resume talking, including back channeling if necessary (but without using Trillanes types).”

May a friendly and neighborly tone dominate the coming Aquino-Li conversation.